Magdalena Alagna
Ash Wednesday

Ash Wednesday

I stand in the mass of a crowded city. I see
A woman cradling tulips against a scrim of river.
Tonight I will dream
I have flown over the ocean.

A woman is cradled against a scrim of river
But I hear the spent wind lisp its terrors.
I have flown over the ocean
To be ambushed by such simple beauty.

I hear the spent wind lisp its terrors.
The street is steeped in evening’s herbs.
Ambushed by such simple beauty, I
Thumb a soft cross on my forehead.

The street is steeped in evening’s herbs.
An argosy of dying sun keels on the wall.
I thumb a soft cross on my forehead.
The bent red horizon genuflects.

An argosy of dying sun keels on the wall,
A cargo of sins hauled in its nets.
The bent red horizon genuflects.
I am blue and burning like a struck match.

Sunset slants its threads like a net.
I kneel at the mouth of this hungry season,
Blue and burning like a struck match
The air cancels to ether.

I kneel at the mouth of this hungry season.
Tonight I will dream
The air has canceled me to ether.
I stand in the mass of a crowded city.

Poet's Biography:

Magdalena Alagna is a freelance writer, an editor at Long Shot magazine, and a candidate in the Poetry MFA program at Hunter College in New York City. Her poetry has appeared or is forthcoming in the anthologies In Our Own Words, Estrogenius, and The Pagan's Muse, as well as in various magazines and online journals, including Venus in the Mirror, The Bitter Oleander, Prometheus, La Petite Zine and Medicinal Purposes. She was the 2001 winner of the Paolucci Prize for Poetry.